1998 Review May Part 2

LANCASTER - Teacher Craig Fulladosa was fired from his job as an art instructor at Highland High School after results of an Antelope Valley Union High School District investigation found pornography from the Internet on his school computer.

PALMDALE - Architects will begin designing a new civil courthouse and a new office building for the city after money for the work was set aside by the City Council.

PALMDALE - With some misgivings, the City Council approved setting aside up to $60,000 to fund a commission to analyze the efficiency of Los Angeles County, and whether the nation's most populous county should be broken up.

LANCASTER - Rosamond resident Scott Glenn Mullins was ordered to stand trial for the August 1997 murder of his estranged wife.
May 16

LANCASTER - Calling Tom Hanks. Local officials would like to recruit power hitters like the star of "Apollo 13" and maker of "From the Earth to the Moon" to help sell California's role in the space program. California Space and Technology Alliance proponents made their pitch in Lancaster on Friday. It's the kind of sales job they are taking across the state.

PALMDALE - The cost of rubbish collection for residents and businesses will rise about 3% under contract amendments approved by the City Council.
May 17

LITTLEROCK - A three-vehicle collision involving a tractor-trailer rig killed a man Saturday afternoon on Highway 138 and 96th Street East.
May 19

LOS ANGELES - Three Southern California suburbs within 50 miles of the Antelope Valley ranked among the nation's safest cities with populations of more than 100,000, according to FBI statistics. Thousand Oaks was No. 1 in 1997, marking the third consecutive year that a Ventura County community topped the list. Simi Valley, the nation's most crime-free city in 1996, was a close second in 1997, while Antelope Valley's neighbor, Santa Clarita, was third.

EDWARDS AFB - The F-22 Raptor ripped up the skies at Edwards Sunday on its first test flight in the Valley.
May 20

SACRAMENTO - It may not be a case of share and share alike as far as transit money for the Antelope Valley is concerned, but at least it's a share. The state Assembly overwhelmingly passed a bill requiring Los Angeles' Metropolitan Transportation Authority to develop a plan to deal each of the county's 89 cities a stake in the state transportation dollars pot.

LANCASTER - A proposed gas station and mini-market at Sierra Highway and Avenue M can be built as planned, as long as beer and wine aren't available inside, planning commissioners decided.
May 21

LANCASTER - Signatures of 500,000 students will accompany John Glenn into space in October. Some of those signatures will belong to Antelope Valley children. Desert Vineyard Christian School in Lancaster was one of the early birds, presenting their signatures to Lockheed officials Wednesday.
May 22

PALMDALE - Palmdale's mothballed hospital could house medical students under a plan presented by the Antelope Valley Union High School District. The plan includes the purchase of the expired medical facility by the high school district's nonprofit education foundation for $1 million.

Desert Palms Community Hospital, which closed in March 1996, is owned by Texas-based Paracelsus Healthcare Corp. Paracelsus purchased the medical facility in 1993 for $4.5 million to expand into mental health and obstetrics.

PALMDALE - City officials are supporting a Caltrans plan to develop a new east-west freeway between the Antelope Valley Freeway and Interstate 15 near Victorville. The first phase of the plan includes construction of the west end of the new freeway - connector ramps leading to and from the AV Freeway at about Avenue P-6, plus a short section of freeway leading east.
May 23

BORON - A federal prison camp slated for closure by the Department of Justice could be used as a detention and deportation center for illegal immigrants under a proposal by the Immigration and Naturalization Service.

The switch could prevent the complete deactivation and disposition of the 173-acre facility, which houses about 500 inmates and employs about 108 people.
May 24

LANCASTER - Sheriff's deputies used search and rescue dogs to search for more than two hours Saturday afternoon in an effort to find any trace of a man missing since Wednesday morning. The effort failed. The 28year-old man was reported missing by his wife after he didn't return from his classes at Antelope Valley College.
May 26

LANCASTER - A man was gunned down in an east Lancaster neighborhood Monday afternoon. His bloodied T-shirt and ball cap lay on the side of the street for hours while deputies waited for homicide investigators to arrive from Los Angeles. Sgt. Chris Haymond of the Lancaster Sheriff's Station said the shooting was apparently the result of an argument.

LANCASTER - While many World War II servicemen, who gathered at Joshua Memorial Park, struggled to remember events more than 50 years past, one Vietnam-era veteran wanted to forget details of his military life.

"I was there early and late," said John Lucas, who made three tours of duty battling the spread of communism in Vietnam.

PALMDALE - Hundreds of flags decorated grave sites at Desert Lawn Memorial Park, reminders that the nation took a break this weekend to pay tribute to those who sacrificed their lives to protect freedom.
May 27

WASHINGTON, D.C. - The House of Representatives passed a bill that will provide $39 million for a major face-lift at Edwards Air Force Base and also create millions of dollars in additional work for Plant 42.

PEARBLOSSOM - Sharon Millen, principal of Pearblossom Elementary School, has been chosen as California's 1998 National Distinguished Principal.

Millen, who leads her 450-student school with great enthusiasm, is well thought of by all her colleagues, said her superintendent, Jean Fuller.

VAN NUYS - Days after the crash, Joel Charles Kyne couldn't remember how he ended the life of Erica Nemback. After being sentenced Tuesday, Kyne is unlikely to forget. Kyne received 15 years to life in state prison, the standard sentence for second-degree murder, after being found guilty last month in the drunken-driving death of the popular elementary school teacher.
May 28

LANCASTER - The Private Industry Council of Los Angeles County is expected to approve a program that would provide free re-employment assistance, job retraining, support services and employment workshops for Antelope Valley residents. The problem is there may not be enough local jobs for the residents who need the benefits.
May 29

PALMDALE - Building a new commercial airport on 17,000 desert acres owned by the city of Los Angeles' Department of Airports can't legally begin until commercial air operations at existing Palmdale Regional Airport reach 200 a day, an Air Force official reported. Lt. Col. Robert Catlin, Air Force Plant 42 commander, told an informal breakfast gathering of Antelope Valley leaders that his review of the joint-use agreement for Plant 42 as Palmdale Regional Report turned up the limitation on Department of Airports' development at the adjacent site.

QUARTZ HILL - Friends, co-workers, students and family of James Valentine DuPratt Jr. all called him the same thing during the dedication of a tree and stone placed in his honor Thursday - they called him "teacher."

DuPratt's former student, Corey Rich, explained it best in a letter he sent because he was unable to attend the ceremony.

"Officially, DuPratt taught American literature and journalism. What he really taught was Life 101, or lessons in the meaning of life," Rich said in his letter.
May 30

CALIFORNIA CITY - More than 500 residents packed the lawn at City Hall to welcome Corrections Corp. of America to the neighborhood. Mayor Larry Adams, who has tried to bring a prison to California City for the past eight years, scheduled David Myers, president of Corrections Corp. of America, as the last speaker on the schedule.
May 31

PALMDALE - A majority of Los Angeles City Council members say they favor looking into expansion of regional airports, such as Palmdale's - before debating the Los Angeles International Airport expansion Master Plan next year.